Ascendis Pharma A/S (NASDAQ:ASND) vs. Valneva (NASDAQ:VALN) Head-To-Head Contrast

Ascendis Pharma A/S (NASDAQ:ASND) and Valneva (NASDAQ:VALN) are both healthcare companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, earnings, profitability, valuation and dividends.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings and target prices for Ascendis Pharma A/S and Valneva, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Ascendis Pharma A/S	0	1	18	1	3.00
Valneva	2	0	1	0	1.67

Ascendis Pharma A/S currently has a consensus target price of $309.26, suggesting a potential upside of 32.78%. Valneva has a consensus target price of $9.30, suggesting a potential upside of 63.01%. Given Valneva’s higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Valneva is more favorable than Ascendis Pharma A/S.

Profitability

This table compares Ascendis Pharma A/S and Valneva’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Ascendis Pharma A/S	70.99%	32.54%	7.71%
Valneva	-110.33%	-153.20%	-39.50%

Insider and Institutional Ownership

11.4% of Valneva shares are owned by institutional investors. 40.0% of Ascendis Pharma A/S shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 14.9% of Valneva shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Ascendis Pharma A/S and Valneva”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Ascendis Pharma A/S	$814.57 million	17.84	-$258.00 million	$12.89	18.07
Valneva	$197.56 million	2.74	-$130.33 million	($2.11)	-2.70

Valneva has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Ascendis Pharma A/S. Valneva is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Ascendis Pharma A/S, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Volatility and Risk

Ascendis Pharma A/S has a beta of 0.38, indicating that its stock price is 62% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Valneva has a beta of 1.53, indicating that its stock price is 53% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Ascendis Pharma A/S beats Valneva on 11 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Ascendis Pharma A/S

Ascendis Pharma A/S, a biopharmaceutical company, focuses on developing therapies for unmet medical needs. It offers SKYTROFA for treating patients with growth hormone deficiency (GHD). The company is also developing a pipeline of three independent endocrinology rare disease product candidates in clinical development, as well as focuses on advancing oncology therapeutic candidates. The company was incorporated in 2006 and is headquartered in Hellerup, Denmark.

About Valneva

Valneva SE, a specialty vaccine company, develops, manufactures, and commercializes prophylactic vaccines for infectious diseases with unmet needs. It offers IXIARO, an inactivated Vero cell culture-derived Japanese encephalitis vaccine indicated for active immunization against Japanese encephalitis; DUKORAL, an oral vaccine for the prevention of diarrhea caused by Vibrio cholera and/or heat-labile toxin producing enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli bacterium; IXCHIQ, a single-dose, live-attenuated vaccine for the prevention of disease caused by chikungunya virus; and VLA2001, an inactivated whole-virus COVID-19 vaccine. The company also develops VLA15, a vaccine candidate, which is in Phase III clinical trial against Borrelia, the bacterium that causes Lyme disease; VLA1553, a vaccine candidate, which is in Phase III clinical trial against the chikungunya virus; VLA1554, a vaccine candidate targeting human metapneumovirus; and VLA2112, a vaccine candidate to treat patients with epstein-barr virus. It sells its products in the United States, Canada, Germany, Austria, Nordics, the United Kingdom, France, rest of European countries, and internationally. Valneva SE has collaborations with Pfizer, Inc. to co-develop and commercialize its Lyme disease vaccine; and Instituto Butantan for the development, manufacturing, and marketing of single-shot chikungunya vaccine. The company was founded in 1998 and is based in Saint-Herblain, France.